Nintendo Download: Bonsai Barber, The Revenge of Shinobi and City Transport Maps (EU)

Zoonami's hairdressing game is finally out, and it's accompanied by Sega's awesome ninja game. Oh, and some city maps.

After skipping a week, the Official Nintendo Magazine has once again revealed the Wii/DSi updates in advance. As promised a while ago, today finally sees the European release of Bonsai Barber. Accompanying it is a single Virtual Console game and two DSiWare applications which might as well be counted as one, because they pretty much do exactly the same!

Bonsai Barber was already released in North America about half a year ago, despite being a UK-developer game. Thankfully, it's now finally available in Europe! Don't be fooled by the game's cutesy look - Cutting the "hair" of various vegetables has never been as fun as this. Plus, Nintendo themselves are publishing it - If that's not proof of awesomeness, we don't know what is! You can read what we thought of the game here.

On Virtual Console, you'll be able to download the second Shinobi game - The Revenge of Shinobi. Generally considered the best game in the series, this game has almost never been rereleased, and wasn't included in any recent Sega collections because of licensing issues - The original game featured characters like Spider-Man and the Hulk as bosses! The original Mega Drive game was reissued a few times very soon after release, with each reissue replacing some of these characters, so we really wonder which version will be the one on Virtual Console! We'll review the game soon.

DSiWare gets another two applications - City Transport Map Volumes 1 & 2 - 2009 both include maps of various European cities, which have subways, trams and other transports marked on them, so you can easily find your way around. You can also attach DSi photos to spots on the map to remind yourself what exactly is located there. At 500 DSi Points each, these will really only be useful for people who travel to other countries often - We can't imagine anyone else finding much use in them. Nevertheless, we'll review them soon.

That's all for this week! All of these will be available at the usual time tonight.

I agree, that could be handy for Boston or New York, if the interface is nice, particularly with the photo feature ("oh, so I saw that singing drunkard on the Red Line near Porter Square, good to remember").

I am interested in the map apps, but I somehow doubt they'll make it for Canadian cities like Ottawa and Toronto. Especially since Ottawa is having a lightrail installed, it'd be out of date in a few years... Which brings up a point.. How do these games update when the city changes something, like a bus route or add subway tracks?

not a bad week overall for eu, i love the idea of maps, if that also came with bus times then it be the best app on dsiit would be a great idea if they would release other parts to countries for people that travel

Laaaaaaaaame. Why only two games on the Wii and only one WiiWare game? It's not like there's a lack of them. I can see a use for the transport maps provided they include a large number of cities and not just a handful of major ones. Still after a 3 WiiWare update it's extremely strange to go back to one.

sighBad Friday again, when comes something @#@! MORE interesting to DSiWare....? Like MFC, M vs. DK: MMA!, Flipnote, Pop +, MyNotebook, clubhouse games (xD), braintraining: Arts, Game & Watch, Mr. Driller, 2 in 1 solitaire , 1 in 6 translator and UNO... Bit much called xD, but it is still nice that Nintendo gives us those things... Hopefulling is next Friday more interesting....

I'd buy the DS maps if visiting or living close to any of the cities provided. A real map costs just a much, but if you're already carrying your DS then why bother with extra stuff? Of course it depends on the quality of each map... but little features like the ability to snap photos and "attach" them to the map, or a quick search capability, could make this really fun.

I like seeing useful productivity apps for the DS. It's not a "must have", but it certainly is a cool (and practical) use of the system.

Nothing for me to download this week. OK update but April onwards could've been and should've been SO much better. To be fair we've had some very decent games in that time and I have plenty to be getting on with, so....

Maps app eh? I wouldn't mind one for the UK cities!

Couldn't we have got a DSiWare GAME as well as apps NoE? Aaaahh well, I look to next Friday....

Revenge of Shinobi - I'd get it if was not going to be 50hz like every other SEGA console game on the PAL VC. Even the great music is slowed down! If only they would fix it I'd have downloaded loads of their games...

awesome update for the guys in EU, I have this on the 6 Pak for my Genesis, the shinobi series is awesome, wish I could find the cart by itself, oh this game is also rated for the states, so it should come out anytime now

The city maps appear to have only 5 cities each and only capitals. Useless IMO, you won't need more than 1-2 of those maps considering the cities are so far apart. If it had all the cities of one country in a pack (and one pack per country) I'd probably buy it for Germany. As it is I can just grab a transport overview map in Berlin for free and get all the same use out of it.

@KDR_11k: The maps are aimed at tourists, not just Germans. A map over all the cities in Germany would sell to anyone not going there living there, while these packs are of use to anyone going to any of these highly popular tourist cities. Getting the most useful maps out first is the best idea.Also, the packs are 500 points each, which is what you'd pay for a good map of one of these cities anyway - add in that these maps are interactive and searchable, and you get pretty good value for your money if you're going to one of these cities.

A tourist might visit another part than just Berlin. I don't need a map of my hometown because I know what's where but I'd appreciate a map of cities I might visit. I'm more likely to visit Munich than Moscow.

Of course a tourist may go other places, but when only a few cities get maps, the maps should be of places most tourists would go to. Likewise, you might rather go to München than Moscow, but most Europeans wouldn't, and as mentioned, the maps are aimed at the average European, not the average German.I'd have more use of a map of Oslo than either of the offered cities, but it's not aimed solely at me either, and I'm in a definite minority there.